


Warrior

by stressedoutteenager



Category: SKAM (TV)
Genre: Bullying, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-02
Updated: 2017-09-02
Packaged: 2018-12-22 23:23:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11977254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stressedoutteenager/pseuds/stressedoutteenager
Summary: This is based on an Italian song - Guerriero by Marco Mengoni.Yousef being there for Sana during her tough time at middle school and even after that.





	Warrior

The idea of starting middle school was really exciting to Sana. 

The idea of meeting new people, making new friends, getting to learn more about anything and everything. 

The idea of being a new person, even if it’s just the change of going from primary to secondary school. 

Everyone around her knew how excited she was. 

Her parents, her siblings, Jamilla, her neighbours and even her brother’s best friend that kept coming around the house a lot.

When Sana came home from school on the second day, she tried to hide how she feels. She’s not a child anymore, she thought, she shouldn’t be so upset about stupid comments. 

Somehow, she managed to walk past her parents, past her siblings, past everyone without anyone suspecting how bad she really feels. 

A cheery: “I ate with friends”, as the excuse to not have to face anyone for the rest of the day worked and Sana ended up sitting alone in her room, in her bed, with the blanket drawn up to her chin. Like a shield.

How did all her plans for middle school vanish in just two days?

Why are people so awful? Just because Sana looks different from them. Knowingly, proudly.

One of the things Sana looked forward to most starting middle school was wearing the hijab.

The only thought that keeps her from crying that day, sitting in her darkening room, after the second day of middle school, is the pride she takes in what she chooses to wear.

-

That first though week was not the only one.

It kept going. The people in her class, in her grade kept making Sana feel horrible. No amount of pep-talking yourself, no amount of trying to see the bright side of all things helped.

Acting like everything is fine got harder.

“How was school?”, became the dreaded question.

Sana didn’t want to lie. However, she also didn’t want her family to worry.

She’s not a child anymore, she can handle it on her own, Sana thought. She didn’t want to look weak.

As acting like everything’s alright got harder, Sana’s facade started to crumble.

One time, at the dinner table, Sana zones out. She doesn’t hear a thing her family is talking about. Is it selfish to say that she doesn’t care? Can what they’re talking about make the permanent lump in Sana’s throat, the sinking feeling in her stomach go away? Is anything they’re saying going to make the situation Sana is in better?

Sana knows that she doesn’t have the right to think this. She didn’t ask for help so she can’t expect them to know. 

“Sana.”, someone at the table calls out her name a little loudly and makes her jump.

All eyes on her, her parents’, an uncle’s, her brothers’ and two of their friends’.

When Sana hears her name being called out like that all she can think of is that girl on the schoolyard, looking to catch Sana when she’s alone to say such mean things that Sana couldn’t have thought of if she tried. 

Sana smiles and shrugs it off.  
Pretending all is good is easier than telling them what’s really happening in her life.

That evening, after dinner, Sana is left alone in the kitchen when everyone hurries of to do their own thing and she really doesn’t have anywhere to go, she doesn’t have friends to rush to. 

“Hi.”, she hears coming from the kitchen door. 

Looking up from her phone she only has been staring at mindlessly, Sana sees her brother’s best friend, Yousef.

Sana smiles lightly and looks down at her phone again. Yousef is at her house a lot. Since Elias met him in primary school those two are inseparable. Sometimes she sees Yousef more often that her eldest brother. 

A few seconds pass and all Sana hears is the fridge opening and closing and just when she thinks Yousef left, she hears him start talking again. 

“Hey, do you want to watch a movie with us?”, Yousef asks Sana, shyly looking from his glass of juice to her and back to his juice. Then he lifts his eyes to her again and continues: “We can’t decide what to watch, you can be the deciding vote.”

Sana raises her eyebrows in surprise. He sounds genuinely interested in Sana watching a movie with them. He waits for an answer, silently, letting her think. Only when she nods he starts smiling and they go to the living room together. 

-

Time goes by, Sana has better days, and worse days. 

Her brother Elias starts going to Elvebakken and him and Yousef meet a bunch of other guys and become really close. How does Sana know? They’re always at her house. 

At first it bothered her. Not the boys. But that they were there all the time. Reminding her that she doesn’t have an amazing friend group like his brother has. 

It only bothers her for a short amount of time.   
One time, Yousef asks is she wants to play soccer with them. She does. And after that she gets invited to hang out with them all the time. They distract Sana from anything else that is going on, which they have no idea of. 

Still, after a day of hanging out, usually one of them stays longer and sometimes sleeps over. Yousef.   
  


When Sana wakes up, it’s around 2 am. She’s sweating and her heart is racing. Panicking, she looks around herself and is relieved when she sees the familiar blue walls of her room and not the schoolyard. Her chest is rising and falling quickly, her throat is dry and her eyes burn. Gulping and then trying to take deep breaths, Sana throws the blanket off of her and goes to open her window. 

The fresh air helps a little but she can’t go back to sleep. She might have the same dream, nightmare. It’s not far from the reality, which makes it even scarier. 

It’s unfair, Sana thinks. It’s unfair that she’s not even really safe from the stuff that happens in school when she’s sleeping. Sana rubs her eyes, grabs a headscarf to throw over her hair and leaves her room. She needs something to drink, she needs to do something to get over that nightmare. 

She’s been living here her whole life, she doesn’t need to turn on the lights to get to the kitchen.

What surprises her is that there’s someone in the kitchen.

Sana squints her eyes, trying to get used to the bright light. Her room was dark and so was the hallway.

It’s Yousef who’s sitting at the kitchen table, his phone in his hand.   
Sana almost forgot that he’s sleeping over at her house. But only almost. Subconsciously she had grabbed a headscarf to cover her hair before leaving her room.

Yousef hears Sana come into the room and lifts his eyes to meet her. She’s in pyjamas, looks a little grumpy and her eyes are puffy.

A sharp feeling goes through his chest but all he does is smile at his best friend’s little sister and say Hi.

“Hey. Is everything okay?”, Sana answers, a worry line forming between her eyebrows.

Yousef nods. “All good. Just couldn’t sleep.”, then Yousef asks her what he’s been asked: “Is everything okay?”

Now Sana nods, not looking at her brother’s best friend. She goes to grab a drink and asks if he wants anything.   
  
Yousef doesn’t push. He doesn’t mention that the reason why he really is in the kitchen is her. That he heard her cry out in her sleep. Elias’ room is right next to hers.   
Yousef didn’t think about it. He just left his best friend’s room and went into the kitchen. Maybe subconsciously hoping that Sana would go there so he can see if she’s okay.

Elias has been noticing that his sister seems to not be as fine as she always says she is. So did his parents. And Yousef, who’s almost living here, did too.

So it’s comical to him that she’s asking him if everything is okay. He wants to ask if there’s something he can help with but he doesn’t want to intrude. Sana and Yousef have become some sort of friends over the past years but how deep that friendship is.. he doesn’t know.

“Can’t sleep?”, Yousef asks in a low voice. It’s so low that Sana could have pretended not to have heard it if she didn’t want to talk.

But she doesn’t. “Didn’t dream well.”

“Nightmare?”, Yousef asks, only to realize that it is a stupid question.

Sana moves a little and settles standing behind the chair across from Yousef’s. She nods.

Yousef sees the puffy eyes, he sees the small smile that doesn’t reach her eyes, he sees the sunken in cheeks. And he decides not to question her more. It won’t help.

Instead he sits up a little bit more straight and smiles. “Want to know what I dreamt last night?”

A distraction is all Sana wanted when she left her room.   
She didn’t think Yousef would be the source of that but she really can’t complain. His weird but funny story about his last dream makes Sana completely forget about her own dream.

First she laughs at the absurdity of his dream.

Then they proceed to try and analyse it.

“Please don’t go all Freud on me.”, Yousef says laughingly, looking at Sana with wide eyes, his hair messily falling on his forehead.

“I would never. Not Freud.”, Sana answers with a matching laugh.

_I’ll defend you from nightmares and sadness_

- 

For some time school is fine. Sana finds support in Jamilla who she made promise not to tell her family what was going on because all of it would pass soon enough.   
It did. For a short period of time. It was like the bullying never happened. Well, on the bullies’ side. They didn’t torment Sana anymore, they just acted like she’s not there, like she’s invisible. And that was fine with Sana. 

Until one day, this boy hit on her. Really disgustingly. Sana, who didn’t know what to do except for saying no, did exactly that. She said No. She wasn’t interested and he was disrespectful. 

Going home that day Sana didn’t expect anything to happen about that. She has seen boys losing it when girls rejected them more than once. 

Well, she thought wrong. 

It was almost as if they knew when Sana would step into her house. As if it was perfectly planned. 

The second Sana steps into the house and closes the door behind her, her phone starts ringing. Countless messages. Very confused as to why she’s receiving so many messages, Sana takes her phone, reads the first one, the next one, the one after that and lets her phone fall. 

Tears spring into her eyes, her hands shake tremendously and Sana feels like she can’t breathe. She really can’t. When the tears start rolling down her cheeks she falls back onto the door and tries to breathe in and out.

She thought it’s over. 

She thought the only thing to worry about now was not having friends. She thought she could solve that problem in 10th grade. She thought she didn’t have to hear hateful comments like that anymore.

“Sana? Is that you?”, someone calls. But Sana doesn’t hear that. She shuts her eyes, trying to convince herself that this is just a dream, just a nightmare, but it doesn’t work. 

“Oh my god, Sana. What happened?”, the voice is nearer now and makes Sana open her eyes. 

Her brother stands in the hallway and looks at his little sister with worry and concern in his eyes. When Sana sees Elias, she can’t hold it together anymore. Her knees give out, the tears start coming faster and breathing is impossible. 

Elias, never really having seen his sister like this, runs over to her and hugs her tightly, trying to make her stand. When she doesn’t budge, he sits down next to her, trying to help somehow. Trying to do something that helps his sister. Knowing what was the reason for this would have been helpful be he has no idea. 

“Sana, hey. It’s all going to be fine. I’m right here. You’re safe here, we’re home.”, Elias whispers. He tries to sound calming even when he is freaking out for his sister. 

“Dude, we need to leave now. What are you doing…”, another voice is heard. 

Sana has her face buried in her older brothers’ chest, trembling with sobs. Elias holds her closely, as if this will help her. Elias’ head snaps up and he sees his friends come out of the living room. All of them stop abruptly, confused about what’s happening. Elias shakes his head at them and Yousef immediately understands. 

His stomach sinks, seeing and hearing Sana cry like that. But the important thing is to leave her be with her brother. So Yousef quickly turns around, making the boys go back to the living room. Closing the door behind him, Yousef ignores the boys’ questions and just leans on the door for a moment. 

What made Sana feel so horrible? And how will she feel better, how can he help?

The same evening Elias found out what was happening and he was ready to face every single one of the people that had sent his sister those awful messages. He read them. His parents did too.

While the parents tried to comfort Sana by promising that all that would be over now, that the school would be notified and those people’s parents, Elias was ready to just go and find all those people. He didn’t know what he would do, probably shout a lot. 

Had it not been for Yousef Elias probably might have gotten himself into trouble the following days.   
While being there for Sana and distracting her, Elias was so mad and whenever he thought of those messages and what Sana probably had endured during school he wanted to just get up and leave and confront those kids. At one point he got close. 

Sitting in the living room with Yousef and Mikael, Elias keeps looking at the door. His day at school ended earlier than Sana’s. But she should have arrived home ten minutes ago. What if something happened? Sure, they talked to the school staff and somewhat cleared the situation but kids can be horrible. 

“Okay,  I’m going. Stay here or go home, I don’t really care.”, Elias says, as he shoots up from his seat on the sofa. 

Mikael and Yousef turn their heads away from the TV and look at him questioningly. Mikael asks where he’s going.

Throwing his hands in the air, Elias answers quickly, already going to the door to put on his shoes.   
“Sana’s school. I need to check if she’s fine. And conveniently I might meet some of those people.”

Yousef is by his best friend’s side in a matter of seconds and blocks his way to the door.   
“Elias, don’t. Sana wouldn’t want you to. And you have a cell phone. Call her instead.”

Elias starts shaking his head but Yousef doesn’t take a No as an answer. From what he has seen in the past couple of days is that Sana hates talking about all of that. She wouldn’t want Elias to make a scene. 

-

Yousef walks up to the door of the Bakkoush house to study with Elias just as Sana storms out of the house. She is too mad, too angry to look where she is going and Yousef is staring at his phone, as always. 

No wonder that they crash into each other. 

“Sorry.”, Yousef quickly says, to only then notice that it’s Sana he walked into. 

Sana just stops for a short moment, and starts walking again. 

“Hey, wait. Sana!”, Yousef calls after her and she stops.

When she turns around slowly, Yousef sees the smudged make up around her eyes and the distressed look on her face. 

“Are you okay? What happened?”, Yousef takes a slow step towards her, while Sana just looks at him for a moment and shakes her head so subtly that it’s almost unnoticeable. 

Looking at her, then back at the house behind him, Yousef nods to himself. He can imagine what this is about. Her parents and siblings just want to help Sana but maybe they don’t do it the right way or Sana is not ready to talk about it. Well, they’ve been getting into fights a few times lately. 

“Where are you going?”, Yousef asks. Maybe he’s overstepping but it’s Elias’ sister and Yousef and Sana have become friends over time too. 

Shrugging, Sana answers: “Don’t know.”

Hesitating for a second, Yousef takes a tiny step towards her. Sana’s eyes follow that movement but she doesn’t move away. 

“Want me to come with you?”  
Being alone when you’re angry and sad is usually not the best thing, Yousef thinks.   
She can just say no if she doesn’t want that, if she wants to be alone. And that’ll be fine. It’s her call. Yousef just wants to be able to help in a way, if she lets him. 

Slowly, Sana nods.   
They fall into step next to each other. Yousef looks over to her, seeing her lips pressed together and eyebrows furrowed, staring on the sidewalk.

“I’m not coming. Walked into Sana when she was leaving the house. I’m with her, don’t worry.”, Yousef sends the message to Elias and puts his phone away. 

For the rest of the afternoon they walk around aimlessly, anywhere Sana feels like going. 

_I’ll stay by your side as long as you want me to -  I’ll provide you shelter during the storms_

\-                                                                                            

Sana’s first year at Nissen brings a lot of change for her. She loves it. 

Meeting an awesome friend in German class, being introduced to other cool girls and finally being a part of a friend group that she’s not just adopted into because it’s her brother and his friends. Or her eldest brother’s girlfriend. 

Trying to be more social, do more outside of the house, and developing a crush on someone. Almost all of those are good changes. 

Things are better, Sana feels happier.

Especially when the boy she has a crush on and Sana hang out more, usually with his friends with them. But they’d mostly end up in a conversation just the two of them and forget that the others are even there. 

And now, in Sana’s second year at Nissen, he texts her while she has a break during school and is sitting on the schoolyard with her friends. 

 **Yousef** : Hey :)

Any plans for today?

 **Sana** : I get off school in two hours. After that not much

You?

 **Yousef** : Want to hang out?

 **Sana:**  With the boys?

 **Yousef** : I thought just the two of us

if you’re up to it

 **Sana** : sure, I’ll text you later

At the end of that conversations both of them are staring at their phones with the widest grins on their faces.   
Yousef has no idea that Sana freaked out when he asked to hang out and that her friends noticed and helped her text back.  
Sana has no idea that Yousef almost chickened out of asking because he wasn’t sure if she’d agree and that his friends gave him a pep-talk. Even Sana’s brother contributed a little. 

He’s waiting outside of the school. 

Sana doesn’t see Yousef at first, but when she does, she stops walking. Somehow it didn’t fully sink in that she’d be hanging out with him, alone, now. Vilde and Chris agreed that this is a date but Sana is not so sure. Either way, she’s happy to see him. 

Smiling nervously, Yousef greets Sana as she stops to stand in front of him. 

“Hi.”, they say at the same time and laugh shortly. 

“So what’s the plan?”, Sana asks, almost failing to play it cool. She’s nervous, but in a good way. 

Yousef puts his hands into the pockets of his coat and shrugs.   
“What do you want to do?”

Oh, it had seemed to Sana that he would have something in mind but it’s okay that he doesn’t. So she thinks for a moment and opens her mouth to answer but Yousef chuckles lightly. 

Raising her eyebrows, Sana looks at him confused. Even though she doesn’t know why he laughed she feels like laughing with him. 

“I’m kidding. Of course I planned something. Come on.”

They don’t walk long until they arrive at a small café Sana has never been to. On the short walk from the school to here, Yousef told Sana about a little girl from the kindergarten he works in that proposed to him today. At the end of the story Sana’s face hurt from so much smiling. He always has something funny to tell her and she loves it. 

Almost as soon as they sit down a waitress comes up to the table. Putting her bag away and her phone on the table, Sana looks up to her and immediately freezes.

She’d recognize this girl everywhere. And not because she has such fond memories of her. 

“Can I already bring you something to drink?”, the girl asks and looks from Yousef to Sana. 

When her eyes land on Sana, it can be seen in her eyes that she recognizes her. Her face falls for a second but she conceals it quickly. As if she has the right to look like this. She was not the one being bullied. She was the biggest bully. 

Yousef looks at Sana to ask if she knows what she wants to drink already but he stops when he sees her facial expression. Sana looks at the waitress, frozen and her lips parted slightly in shock. 

“Should I come back later?”, the waitress asks. 

That’s when Sana snaps. That girl is smiling at her as if nothing ever happened. While Sana gets flashbacks of all the times she was left to do any task in school on her own, how she was called after with ugly words, how she dreaded to get up and go to school every day. Partly because of the girl standing next to the table now. 

“Sorry.”, Sana says quickly, in a rush, with a short and apologetic look towards Yousef. 

Sana leaves the table and Yousef follows her with his eyes as she runs out of the café, leaving all her stuff. He doesn’t know what just happened. Looking for that waitress for answers doesn’t give him any answers because she just shrugs and turns around to go to another table. 

Yousef gets up and runs after Sana. He gets outside and looks around frantically, his heart beating too fast. Not knowing what just happened makes him worry even more. 

He finds Sana leaning on the wall of the building, wringing her hands together and closing her eyes. She seems to count.

Getting closer, Yousef doesn’t want to scare her so he announces that he’s there quietly: “Sana?”

She opens her eyes and looks at him. Seeing him so worried makes her feel even worse. They walk towards each other and meet in the middle. 

“I’m sorry.”, Sana says, not looking at Yousef but at the ground. She’s not proud of just storming out there. But it’s still hard to properly breathe. She didn’t think she’d be faced with this today. She didn’t think she’d remember anything that happened in middle school especially now. 

Yousef notices that her hands are shaking and everything about this remind him of a couple of years ago. Taking a slow step towards her, he answers her. 

“Don’t worry. Are you okay?”

That question, the caring tone in which Yousef asks her, makes Sana look up and answer honestly. She shakes her head, biting her lip but not being able to hold it in. 

“She’s one of them. From middle school.”, Sana whispers. 

Yousef furrows his eyebrows in worry and now understands her reaction. Taking another step towards her, giving her time to back away, he goes to hug her. 

Sometimes a hug helps more than words can. 

Sana wraps her arms around his torso and leans her head on his shoulder. She tries to concentrate on her breathing, counting to ten and back to one. Like she was told to. But she feels safe in his arms. He holds her close, rubbing her back slightly, hoping that he doesn’t make anything worse. 

“Sana, you’re safe. You’re in a better place now, no thanks to them but because you’re the strongest girl I know.”

Sana feels so safe that she doesn’t even notice that a few tears escaped her eyes until they part from the hug. 

 "Sorry about that…“, Sana points at his shoulder that has a tiny bit of black make up on it. 

Yousef looks at it as best as he can and chuckles.   
"Hey, it’s fine. My coat will gladly wipe away those tears but just one thing: they don’t deserve your tears.”

Sana nods, smiling at Yousef and taking a deep breath. How is he like this? She’s so lucky to have him as a friend and maybe as more than that. 

Holding out his hand to her to take if she wants to, Yousef says: “Okay, now let’s get our stuff from inside and go eat somewhere else.”

He grins at Sana who takes his hand and intertwines their fingers, getting goose bumps at the warm feeling that spreads in her chest. 

“Let’s do that.”

_And I’ll hug you to give strength, always  -  Don’t fear anything I’ll be by your side; with my coat I’ll wipe away your tears_


End file.
